America’s next generation of youngsters should be called “Generation Rex.”

If you’re wondering why playgrounds around the city are so quiet and dog runs are packed, a new report has an answer: More and more US women are forgoing motherhood and getting their maternal kicks by owning handbag-size canines.

Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show that a big drop in the number of babies born to women ages 15 to 29 corresponds with a huge increase in the number of tiny pooches owned by young US women, reports the business-news site Quartz….

“I’d rather have a dog over a kid,” declared Sara Foster, 30, a Chelsea equities trader who says her French bulldog, Maddie, brings her more joy than a child.

“It’s just less work and, honestly, I have more time to go out. You . . . don’t have to get a baby sitter.”

The federal data behind the report show that over the past seven years, the number of live births per 1,000 women between ages 15 and 29 in America has plunged 9 percent.

Given that fewer and fewer men want to marry, I wonder how much of this dog substitute for a child is because fewer men want to marry and there are fewer choices for partners for women? Or have women just bought into the feminist propaganda that life with a dog is just better? Maybe it is for now, but will it always be?

This article says that “in the U.S., 40 percent of women near the end of their childbearing years have fewer children than they would like”:

So what’s driving this gap between ideal and actual family size? Among others things, delays in childbearing, which may be caused by increases in educational attainment, or by the lack of a suitable partner, may play a role. Starting childbearing at a later age means that there are fewer years for a woman to meet her fertility ideals, plus it increases the risk of age-related infertility.

Are women really happy being dog owners for life or is it a phase? What about when they are 40? Will Fluffy be enough?

Many of the comments here and especially in the linked article make clear that many social conservative men have an entitlement mentality that is not too dissimilar to that of the feminists that they decry so much. Many of these men feel that they are entitled to "owning" a woman and that generally speaking, women are not capable of independent volition and, therefor, should not have the same liberties as men.

Does the MSM ever interview successful childess men in a non-critical way about why they don't have children? Why does the honor seem to fall only to successful, childless women? Are we to think that only women's decisions in this area matter? Is this a tacit acknowledgement that women have far more reproductive power than men, far more choice over whose genes are passed on, and who interacts with developing minds?

Perhaps this reality is not more openly acknowledged because people are reflexively uncomfortable holding women responsible for the shape of society.

Well I think some of these women are going to be surprised about how much care and attention dogs need. They are social animals and a lot of the popular breed have chronic medical problems. The vets don't often make house calls these day and pet insurance is almost a must. Small dogs can be the worst when it comes to separation anxiety and "small dog" syndrome. Then dogs don't live as long as people do, how art they going to take it when the dog starts dying. It is not always a peaceful process esp. if you let it go too long.

These woman (our current culture) is not our future, its our past. What our culture is being replaced by I have no idea. But our future is not made up of woman who put their careers first and think of children as a burden. These woman are all genetic dead ends. Welcome to extinction

The question remains unanswered: Why this obsession with pushing people, particularly women, who don't want them into having kids. I understand the desire as a taxpayer to not have to pay for other people's kids (through public assistance). But this obsession from the total opposite direction is a very strange and inexplicable one.

As the father of more than 2.2 children I find the entitlement mentality of anti-natalist singles very strange and inexplicable in that they are expecting to be taken care of by a generation whose existence they regarded as a lifestyle cramp to be avoided or as a burden due to the pittance they paid for public education or transfer payments. The preservation of personal convenience as the highest value in life is antithetical to building the future and ultimately pathetic.

"...they are expecting to be taken care of by a generation whose existence they regarded as a lifestyle cramp..."****************************My property taxes pay for a school system I don't use. And my years of working and paying taxes has helped support the generation that has come before me. Thus, I don't see the problem with this childless person being "taken care of" in the future by your kids.

Further - having done considerable volunteer work, I can tell you that hours and hours and hours of time is donated by childless people to their communities - because THEY HAVE THE TIME. People with full time jobs and long commutes barely have enough time to spend with their kids when they are not exhausted, and generally opt to spend extra time they have with them, as IT SHOULD BE.

And yes, I do run into people with kids in my volunteer gigs. But the people doing the heavy lifting: coordinating, mailing lists, holding office, marketing and outreach - are usually childless or empty nesters.

I and most of the people I know who are childless are successful, hardworking professionals. Perhaps you should direct your ire at the hundreds of thousands of single mothers who get knocked up by cads and then marry the government.

I've got the "belt and suspenders" method of insurance and retirement savings. I wouldn't put a kid in the world to be my personal servant when I get old. Also, I'm not sure that the world necessarily needs more people in general.

And it's not a matter of "personal convenience" today. As a man, marriage and children can simply turn you into a wage slave for the rest of your life (if the lovely bride is so inclined to do that to you).

So please don't force your crap on other people under the guise of being a swell guy and White Knight.

No guise implied or proffered. The choice for there not to be another generation is not solely personal any more than making babies without preparing and providing. It has social and moral implications. Sorry your marriage was a bummer.

How do you know by whom they're expecting to be taken care of? Personally, I expect to be taken care of (should it be necessary) by people who are paid to do so, and I've taken out long-term care insurance for that purpose. I have no children (by choice), and my stepson certainly isn't going to do it; he can barely manage his own life.

You are productive and prudent to save. Well done, truly. But you expect sufificient non-seniors to exist to accept the payments for the care you will be able to afford. You expect a generation to come into being to staff the future you are saving and investing to survive. That is what I meant by expecting to be taken care of.

“It’s just less work and, honestly, I have more time to go out. You . . . don’t have to get a baby sitter.”

This is her rationalization hamster spinning in its wheel at full speed. She spent so much time working on her career instead of working on a family, and now she's seeing the writing on the wall. She's a too-old career grrrrrl that no sane man would willingly impregnate, and so she's explaining away her biological failure.